There are few people whose judgement I trust on the stock market because analysts arguments are ususally full of holes and mostly garbage. Moreover, most people tend to be fairly inconsistent in their advice, lacking conviction and changing quickly as the market changes. There are two analysts that I have a lot of respect for, because their arguments have been always logical, but most of all they have been consistent and full of conviction, they are Don Hays, who has a service I subscribe to, and Ken Fisher who has written some good books and writes for Forbes. In his latest article Fisher calls this market “A beautiful market“. He had been bearish for the last two years or so but changed his stance roughly two months ago. Among some of the things he is saying that impressed me about his conviction:
“This market is sheer beauty–the most stunning I’ve ever seen clearly. Maybe not as beautiful as 1974, but perhaps as a young man I didn’t see that right.”
“This bear, with a 48% decline in the S&P 500 at its worst point this summer, falls in the middle of the range of the seven big bear markets of the last century. With the exception of the Great Crash, which took the Dow down 89% between 1929 and 1932, big bear markets have sliced stock prices 42% to 55%. But if you think this is like 1929-32 you are delusional: Absent are the 1930s’ massive global trade barriers, the massive worldwide destruction of the quantity of money and the massive economic dislocations.”
“Following all the big market drops came 12-month advances, ranging from 29% to 65%, with a 50% average. That’s big. And beautiful.”
Well, there you have it, is one man’s opinion but he has been fairly consistent, I wish I had listened to him more two years ago. By the way Don Hays has been bullish for a while, but he always seems to be early, he was bearish since about late 1998 or so.

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